Updated: Feb 8
Please click here for a list of posts relating to cases in which Honenu provided legal counsel to victims of antisemitic attacks in Jerusalem.
Thursday, January 5, 2023, 8:12 Honenu Attorney Chayim Bleicher wrote a letter (see below) to the Jerusalem District Police demanding that they investigate an Arab bus driver working for the Superbus transport company whose reckless driving injured an elderly passenger. The driver drove wildly through Jerusalem and despite an injury to an approximately 80-year-old passenger, refused to stop and allow her to receive medical treatment. He also refused to speak to her son on the phone.
Bleicher explained that this was not an isolated incident and stated, “Time after time, Honenu’s Department of Terror Victims receives complaints about Arab bus drivers and service providers who have abused or injured Jewish passengers or customers. This is a sort of hidden terrorism that repeatedly crosses new red lines. There is a need to eradicate this phenomenon and prevent those who use their jobs as opportunities for assault from continuing at their place of work.”
In his letter, Bleicher wrote, “My client, an approximately 80-year-old woman, boarded the bus driven by the complainee on Eliyahu Koren Street. Before my client managed to sit down, the complainee slammed on the brakes. My client was thrown toward the front of the bus and fell hard onto the floor. My client felt sharp pains all over her body and asked the complainee to stop driving and summon medical care for her immediately. At that time, there were no other people on the bus. The complainee told my client that he would pick her up. My client refused and pleaded for medical treatment. However, the complainee decided for himself and against my client’s will to pick her up by force. In complete opposition to her wishes, he sat her on a bus seat and continued driving. My client screamed in pain and pleaded with the complainee to stop and summon medical care for her, but the complainee obstinately kept driving. He started to let passengers on at bus stops and maintained complete apathy to her condition,” described Bleicher.
Bleicher detailed the ordeal: “My helpless client called her son and asked him to speak to the complainee, but he [the complainee] refused. Her son called the police. Then a policewoman called my client’s cell phone and asked the complainee to speak to her, but he refused. At this point, the son asked my client to give her phone to one of the passengers who had boarded the bus. With the help of the passenger, the son asked the driver to stop and call for an ambulance, but he continued driving and paid no attention to the requests. The policewoman to whom he had spoken summoned an ambulance to the Givat HaMatos bus stop. At the Givat HaMatos bus stop my client was forced to disembark [before a medical examination], with great difficulty and the assistance of a passenger who disembarked with her. From there, my client was transported by ambulance for medical treatment.
“This was an incident of assault, kidnapping, and prevention of medical care on a most atrocious and unfathomable level. My client experienced ‘hell’ at the hands of the merciless driver whose motives must be investigated. The complainee forcibly lifted my client after the injury, against all medical guidelines, and could have exacerbated the damage. My client was badly bruised. Miraculously no new fractures were found and she was released to rest at home. Since the incident, my client has been lying in bed, suffering from pain, as her family cares for her. The cruel event caused great suffering and trauma to my client’s children and grandchildren, because of the distress caused to their mother and grandmother. The need to detain the complainee is all the more necessary due to his being a public bus driver in whose hands the lives of many passengers are entrusted every day. I demand that you order his immediate detention and interrogation for this incident and for other incidents that he is likely to have been involved with due to the nature of his behavior, and bring him to justice,” concluded Bleicher.